Presently, the bulk of consumer products are sold by mass merchandizing. Large retail stores are provided with elaborate arrays of shelves, counters, and floor displays for maintaining boxed products offered for sale. Such retail establishments have minimized the number of store personnel required to operate the same, thus increasing the overall profitability of the store. Additionally, in order that a large variety of products may be made available for sale, the amount of shelf space allotted to each product is carefully determined. With such shelf space restrictions, the manufacturers of products are under increasing pressure to present the same in compact packages having point of sale advertising and promotional material imprinted thereon. Such compact packaging gives rise to the need for assembly of most products by the consumer subsequent to their purchase.
It is most desirable that consumer products requiring assembly by the purchaser be so designed and configured to minimize the complexity of the assembly procedure and to further minimize the requirement of tools and mechanical aptitude. Such products oftentimes are provided with mating snaps or latches allowing modularized portions of the product to be "snap fit" together with the ultimate securement being attained by means of a minimum of screws or the like. Electrical interconnections between the various product portions are generally facilitated by means of plugs and jacks or other similar electromechanical devices. Typically, when modularizing products for packaging purposes, it is most desirable that the extension of elements from one module to the other be minimized such that only housings need be interconnected, rather than mechanically or electrically operative parts.
It has previously been known that floor care cleaning devices such as upright cleaners may be marketed in a compact package by presenting the cleaner as three separate structural elements adapted to be quickly and easily interconnected with each other, employing a minimum number of tools and mechanical dexterity. Such upright cleaners are typically packaged with a separate cleaner head or body, a lower handle portion, and an upper handle portion. Those skilled in the art will recognize that in such upright cleaners, the cleaner head or body receives and houses the vacuum and agitator motor, agitator, brush assembly, and power switch. The lower handle portion is typically provided with a dirt receptacle or means for supporting a filter bag or the like, along with the requisite air passage conduit to allow the dirt receptacle or bag to intercommunicate with the vacuum-generating motor. The upper handle portion is typically provided with a hand grip at a remote end thereof, a bag strap for securing a top end of the filter bag, and cord hooks or the like for receiving and maintaining the power cord. As will be appreciated below, the prior art upright cleaners have typically been configured such that the three structural elements may be quickly and easily interconnected by snap-fit connectors, with ultimate securing engagement being provided by a screw at the point of interconnection.
To minimize the number of mechanical and/or electrical interconnections between the three portions of the upright cleaners discussed above, the actuator button for the power switch of the cleaner has typically been positioned on the lower handle portion. However, such positioning has been found to be inconvenient, principally due to its remote location from the hand of the operator. It is most desirable that the power switch and associated actuator button be positioned near the hand grip on upper handle portion to be readily accessed by the user during normal operation. However, to position the actuator button and power switch at the handle grip necessarily requires that electrical wires communicate with each of the three modularized portions of the cleaner from the switch to the motor. The interconnection of the switch and motor so positioned is simply not given to ease of the assembly by a customer, since passing of electrical wires through the three separate components greatly complicates the assembly procedure. Additionally, the cost of the cleaner would be greatly aggravated by the inclusion of interconnecting plugs at the interfaces of various modules if that approach were taken.
It has also been known in the art that the switch and actuator of a floor care cleaning device may be remotely interconnected by a wire or cable. The use of a Bowden cable or a wire form for such purposes is well known. The former consists of a fixed shield slidingly receiving a central wire or cable connected at one end to the switch and at the other to the actuator. The latter consists of a substantially rigid wire received in guides and similarly interconnected. Neither the Bowden cable nor the wire form are given to division into segments received in respective modules or product portions and which may be easily and effectively joined. Indeed, the complexity and cost of such remote actuators are aggravated by attempts at modularization of the same.
Accordingly, there is a need in the art for an extended mechanical linkage from the hand grip of the upper handle portion of the vacuum cleaner to the power switch in the cleaner head, which mechanical linkage is sectioned such that one portion thereof is retained in the upper handle assembly and the second portion thereof is retained in the lower handle assembly, which portions are easily attached and detached during assembly and disassembly operations. Additionally, there is a need in the art for a simple actuator button which may be interconnected with such linkage and which may be quickly and easily attached and detached with respect thereto and which may be maintained at the hand grip of the upper handle portion.